(meaning) adjusting with meticulous measurements

Recently I read the book “Fast Living” by Scott Todd. For me it is a re-calling to live Isaiah 58, to bring justice, help for the poor, sharing with those in need.  I’ve been asking God, “How can we spend ourselves for the sake of the poor more effectively?”

I grew up with a keen sense of awareness of the responsibility of those of us in the advantaged part of the world to tangibly care for those who are disadvantaged. From my earliest memory I had a family member who lived among these ones (my auntie lived in the Philippines for forty years). My sister also lived in the Congo for twenty five years. Both were very dear to me and I have been enriched by the close personal connection to the third world through them. Our family lived with a clear understanding of our responsibility as extended family to give generously to enrich their lives – giving to our dear ones so that they could in turn be generous where they lived in these far away places. It was always our undrstanding that we were not to spend all of our money on ourselves but that we were to be as generous as we could in gifts to those in the greatest need.

God is endlessly creative and as I’ve been listening to Him for ways of being more generous here are some of the ideas He’s brought me in this last year:

• We decided to do something personal and long-term about the earthquake tragedy in Haiti by sponsoring a little five year old boy to go to school through Compassion.
• We asked a group of people we had at Dominion Hill if they would mind having one meal of only rice (to help us identify with the poor) and we donated what we would have spent on the meal to Compassion International (a non-profit dedicated to child sponsorship).
• I started a little shop at Dominion Hill called the Rwanda Shop where some of my friends who are artists have donated some of their work with 100% of the profits sent to a Vineyard family from our region who are church planting in Rwanda.
• I pick up garbage (and cans) as I jog down our road and I send my recycling money to Rwanda as well.
• Whenever I travel to disadvantaged countries I buy gifts for people from Christians there who are learning to support themselves.
• We help support some missionary friends who love the poor in northern Asia.
• I’ve been growing a vegetable garden for the last three years so that I have vegetables to give away locally as well as spending less ourselves on food. From the experience I’m gaining, I’m also hoping to be able to teach the poor in our area how to grow their own food.

These are some of our ideas – I welcome you to share some of yours. It is so wonderful to be encouraged by God’s creativity in each other!

May God’s Kingdom come to this earth in many big and small ways.

Joy

Psalm 37:28a

This is fresh from the pages of recent history.  Last week in fact.  I think we all have things that are hard for us, no matter how many times we face the same thing, it seems always to be an “I don’t know if I’ll get through this” kind of moment.  Sometime in my 50’s I became aware that I have struggled with a fear of abandonment probably all my life.  While I am bold on the outside, emotionally, I am filled with anxiety if I feel abandoned.

This is a problem when you are married to someone who is called to travel a lot! While my intellect is on the right track, often if Gary is away and I am at home, inside I would feel a sense of shame, disorientation and like a loser generally not knowing how to initiate to others.  So I knew I was going to face a test when he was going to be away on our 40th anniversary.  I was fine months ago when we talked about it and agreed that it would be a good thing to do to bless the church he was going to, and we have had to be flexible many times about when a certain birthday, anniversary or whatever was celebrated, but as the time grew closer, I became aware that I needed to ask God to heal me from this stuff.

I asked the Lord to be my husband, like I have many times, and that He would teach me about the truth that he really is my best friend.  Many times he has shown me this, and I have many beautiful stories of how he has shown up practically and been a friend, a husband, a father, whatever was needed, but it has been the same thing as with faith…I leak…and each time it would be the same struggle.  The day of our anniversary started with hosting the school board group here at Dominion Hill, which turned out great.  I got to use my hospitality gifting, and even had a great chat with the superintendant as we went along about my dream of  teaching disadvantaged elementary kids how to grow food.

After that was over, I was just keeping my eyes open for what God was going to bring me for an anniversary gift.  I know he’s into long term commitment, and figured that he would like to celebrate that somehow, because he’s into celebration.  As I was eating supper on our porch, I just happened to look down our driveway, and there was a lovely bright rainbow right at the end of our driveway! Now that is a gift you can’t buy in any store. I knew it was the gift.  The maker of the universe took time to send a rainbow to Digdequash, and made sure I was in a spot where I could see it. Wow, how is that for attention to detail?

I read again the story of the first rainbow, and the themes I felt were appropriate for this time were: a new beginning, and the promise of God’s faithfulness to a family who will obey him, no matter where the mainstream is going, and his honoring of obedience in the face of looking foolish.

With this rainbow gift came a peace that only comes from seeing God show up in such a profoundly impacting way that you can’t mistake it.

And don’t worry…we are going to celebrate our anniversary in Sweden when we’re there in a couple of weeks!

Can you hear David the shepherd-king expressing his thankfulness that not only was he his nation’s leader, but that he had Someone leading him?  Shepherd of the shepherds, leader of the leaders, parent of the parents.  This is a reflection that is a little late for Mothers Day and a little early for Father’s Day, but here we are in between! This Mother’s Day I was thinking about how God parents us as we step into the parenting role.  As we lead, we have Someone leading us, as we listen, His voice is there. It isn’t always a SHOUTING voice, though, and sometimes we have strong SHOUTING emotions that are louder in our ears than His still small voice, so sometimes we get going down the wrong path, and have to stop and listen carefully again. It means we need humility to acknowledge we took a wrong turn, and like a child just wait for instructions rather than trying to look confident and keeping on going down the wrong path.

I had a little reminder of this last week when I babysat two of my grandkids. I was really praying that God would help me with wisdom as Gary was away and I was with them on my own overnight. One had a cough, and woke up in the night, wouldn’t settle back to sleep. I tried, using all the wisdom I had, but couldn’t figure out what was the problem, of course I didn’t want her to go on and on wailing so as to wake her little sister up. The next day, as mommy and daddy returned, I found out what she was trying to say to me, and it all made sense.  I asked her to forgive me for treating her harshly and not understanding what she was getting at.  She said “that’s OK Grandma, I forgive you” and we had a big hug and kisses. I didn’t get the wisdom I needed when I was in the situation where I didn’t know what to do. I got it the next day. That’s just how it is sometimes.  At the time I had strong emotions saying that I needed to re-establish quiet so I didn’t have TWO  wailing children! So I did the best that I knew rather than just waiting and praying.  But the next day I got the wisdom, then had to apologize, ask forgiveness, get relationship restored, and sometimes that’s how it comes!

We were on our way to Christchurch when the news broke that there had been a devastating earthquake.  We were to be at the NZ Vineyard annual pastors and leaders gathering meeting in Christchurch. We’ve never experienced this happening before, the city of destination devastated just before you arrive. Needless to say, the trip was postponed, and we had an unexpected trip to the west coast of BC! During the following weeks, as we were praying for Christchurch, and then Japan, I remembered the Lord speaking the above word to us in 1973, in the midst of the great move of His spirit with the Jesus people.  Haggai is short, only 2 chapters. I encourage you to read it.

What the Lord seemed to be saying to us at that time, (when most Christians felt that Jesus would return momentarily) was not to be busy building our fine houses, but to build His house. (Hag.1:4)  Gary even wrote a song about the above scripture, it so greatly impacted us. We’ve tried to live this way, these many years. What we’ve pursued with our life calling is about building God’s house on this earth.  Larry Crabb, in his book “66 Love Letters”, comments on what it means in our day to build God’s temple, “Whatever you do for my sake that involves the sacrifice of self-interest, whatever you do to reveal Me to others when you feel least able to do so, whatever you do that pleases Me at any cost to yourself, that is building My temple.”

Here we are in 2011, and Jesus has not yet returned, He waits to see His divine purposes fulfilled first.  His word is timeless, and if we are wise we will learn to interpret the signs of the times (Matt. 16: 2,3) for the present day.

I had a dream about 5 years ago that began just after a tsunami hit the beach I was standing on. I was driven further inland, and as I looked at the dry ground beneath my feet, I noticed that it was not bearing my weight as it normally would, and I was sinking into the ground. It seemed that what I was used to understanding was a safe place was no longer so. It occurred to me that I needed to find Jesus, because He is my rock of safety, and when I’m with Him everything is OK.  As I looked around for Jesus, there He was out on the water with His hands outstretched, welcoming me to walk out to Him. Even though I’m not a confident water-walker, there was no other option…the dry land was no longer a safe place for me, and experience has shown me that even though I may be terrified, I’d rather be with Jesus than anywhere else!

I think the dream was just an update on the same theme as the Haggai word in 1973. Never trust in the safety of the familiar, the way things have worked in the past, trust in your relationship with Jesus and stay VERY close to Him. He is all the security you’ll ever need. In the midst of tsunamis, earthquakes, unstable ground, things in this world  being shaken, take courage and do the work of building His temple. He says “I am with you!” Haggai 1:13, and He is my place of peace!

Think of how fear knocks…a thundrous, huge-fisted, slam, slam,slam.  The door is shattering with each blow.  Your response is not one of moving towards the door, you want to run for cover immediately, you are overwhelmed by the SIZE of the sound. Your heart is beating wildly. There must be something very huge and very strong on the other side of that door, and it isn’t anyone you know! The purpose is intimidation. To make you cower, to keep you from facing  it, from seeing who’s there and taking your place in opposition.

“My righteous one will live by faith. And if he shrinks back, I will not be pleased with him…..Now faith is being SURE of what we hope for and CERTAIN of what we do not see.”  Heb.10,11.

Well, we hope for Someone to be always present with us as He has promised.  We hope that the impossible is possible.  We hope that light will overpower darkness. We hope that in our weakness we are made strong. We hope that good will triumph over evil. We hope that the protection that Daniel had in the lions’ den will be there for us. Hope is sometimes where we start on the path to faith.  The only way we will get SURE and CERTAIN is if we face it and watch what happens.

When I was a child I often would see yellow eyes staring at me when I was in bed. I would be terrified by them.  I would lay there for what seemed like a long time and finally I would get enough courage to run into my big sister’s bed and instantly no more yellow eyes. Isn’t that interesting? Doesn’t that say something about the power of community? Just being beside another Christian brought strength to me and cancelled the enemy’s power to intimidate a little kid.

It is the same when we are big, when our enemy is pounding on the door if we have a brother or sister beside us it gives us faith to answer the door.  So often he disappears, and there is no one there, because his real power is in intimidation.  He loves to be seen as God’s co-equal, or better yet, God’s LARGER opponent who is WINNING.  He is not. He was created by God from nothing. He was likely an angel who desired the worship that is due to God alone.

As an adult,  I have had many times when fear knocked at the door.  Sometimes it has taken me some time to realize what is happening, because sometimes it seems so true, but when I can realize that it is the enemy, I have a habit of going right to the door.  By now I know it is such a waste of time to stare into those yellow eyes, they only sap my strength.  It is so much better to just go and answer the door and have the relief of knowing there is no one there.

I think I hear a few yes….buts.

The next day I was at my sister’s house and there I read a book by Jentezen Franklin called “Fasting”.  He used the metaphor of a lover who was lovesick for his loved one and so had lost his appetite.  That is the best description of a positive reason to fast I have heard.  Inspired by him, I spent the first 3 days of Sept. doing a juice fast.  I actually felt this time that I heard from God…it helped me to focus on my bridegroom and listen for him rather than just gutting it out and getting through!

As I listened to His heart for the next season, here is what I felt He said,  ”Your heavenly father already knows all your needs, and He will give you all you need from day to day if you live for him and make the Kingdom of God your primary concern.”Matt. 6:32,33 NLT.  The Message puts it this way, “What I’m trying to do here is to get you to relax, to not be so preoccupied with getting, so you can respond to God’s giving.” The kingdom of God coming to this earth is all about his generosity being poured out, given away. What I felt he was saying to me as I took time out and listened, was simply “share”. Put your focus on giving out, sharing what you have, open your door to give rather than locking it to keep your stuff safe. Consider this a joy. Be overjoyed when you get a chance to give away.  Think of this as a privilege, it’s what you were born for.

I felt the instruction was for this time in history. It is a time of financial downturn in our country and the world, but we are not to be people of poverty, and are not to get stuck in a poverty mindset, but we are to be people who always have something to give.  Whether it is produce from my garden (at least 1 million pumpkins this year), a smile, an encouragement from God, money, some of the gifts God has given me that I lend a hand with.  It can be whatever I have at the moment, but the idea is to have a generous heart, that is looking for ways to have the privilege of giving.

What happened for me the first 3 days of Sept. was as I let my body take a break from normal amounts of food, my father fed me a different kind of banquet, a wonderful banquet of his truth. Delicious!!!!!

Gary and I just returned from a trip to Scandinavia, visiting 4 Vineyards over there, doing 2 Naturally Supernatural weekends. In the early 90’s we had quite a few trips there as well as to Russia when it opened up to the West, seeing the Vineyard get established there, and begin planting churches. Last week Gary had his birthday while there and as it was a very busy time before we left,  I didn’t get around to buying him a present for his 62nd!

So, I asked the Lord to bring him a present. I had never thought of anything like that before moving to Atlantic Canada, but then I’ve never been as stretched as I have been since being here!  Being encouraged by the last 3 years, each year the Lord bringing an awesomely creative gift, with the culmination of last year bringing a grandson for a gift, born on his birthday, I decided to ask again!

This year the gift was also very creative.  He was in Copenhagen Vineyard doing a Naturally Supernatural Conference on his birthday. It was really his ideal crowd.  Young, lots of vision, lots of outward focus towards their city, and the world. Although it was lots of energy, he was doing what he is born for, and that is exhilarating for anyone! So the privilege of serving is a gift. The rest of the story is one that has taken shape over 20 years. I will fill in the background.

About 20 years ago, we were in Copenhagen with a God Rock team of teens and early 20’s. They were trained to be good pray-ers, and ready for anything. God gave me a picture of an old cathedral with all 4 walls and as I watched, they opened outward so that everyone on the outside could see what was going on in the inside.  The idea was none of these people would go into a church, so many misconceptions and reasons why they wouldn’t want to go to church, but if they really knew what went on there, they would love it.  What we did in response to that picture was to take ” church”‘ to the Town Hall square so that everyone could see  one Saturday night.   We had a wonderful worship time , there was a short teaching about the Father heart of God (5 min.)… Gary had some words for people who had physical problems and then there was prayer for them…a couple of  Muslim guys prayed to give their lives to Jesus and we got someone to continue discipling them. A Swedish unmarried couple who came to Copenhagen to go to the sex bars just sat there all evening, the girl with tears coming down her cheeks, because she had once been a Jesus follower and had gone to Bible school.  She was very open to drawing near to Jesus once again in prayer.  It was a wonderful time of seeing Jesus coming to the streets. We prayed for a church in Copenhagen that would be a church that these people could thrive in.

Last week we were in that church. That was the birthday gift. We hadn’t been in Copenhagen in 20 years, just planted the seeds of prayer and had little knowledge of what was going on there in response. What an awesome gift, to encourage us that God doesn’t  forget and He never stops working!

Let me explain the pic. This mural is on a wall in a slum village in Ethiopia we visited in Dec. Their plan is to educate and evangelize the children and see a whole country changed in a generation. The church is partnering with Compassion International and the effect is awesome. The principle is “take our seeming weaknesses, (slum kids with no future hope) and train them with Jesus’ truth, and see strength come where there was no strength. There IS a segue here… can you find it?

As church leaders we often have a sense of what we’re not good at, where we need to grow to produce a healthy church.  But unless we like looking dumb, we can simply avoid that area altogether,  practicing what we’re good at. It’s fun to use the gifts we’re strong in. It brings us joy to be working in our areas of confidence…..ahhhhh…this is what I was born for!

If we look at our natural bodies for a picture of how God works, to see His wisdom through the creation, we see that it is important to work on our weaknesses.  We train areas that are faltering so that strength can be built up. Gary had a lot of back pain some years ago. He  got some back exercises from our chiropractor, did them faithfully and he now has no back pain! I jog most days because that’s one thing that lowers my blood pressure. We both have embraced a healthier diet so that we won’t be taken out of the race with malfunctioning bodies. Practical stuff.

A nuclear family provides us with another picture of stretching and growing…in and out of our comfort zones! Not many of us are experts at training up all ages of kids.  I was better at little kids, Gary was better at understanding teens. If you love your children, you will stay with them and learn new skills, enduring the discomfort, in order to see them be equipped for life.

Apply this same principle to our weak areas as leaders and it looks much the same.  Whatever we practice we get better at.  Sometimes it is painful when we flex things that have not been used much, but eventually we become more adept. Here’s a story:

I have always loved to see people born into the kingdom, choosing a new life and following Jesus for a lifetime.  I looked around our church and noticed that we did a lot of training, but none of it was for pre or new Christians.  I really wanted someone who was good at this kind of stuff to do a class in this area. I would even help them doing-whatever they needed. The problem was I couldn’t find the person with this gifting. I felt the Lord ask me would you do this for Me?  My worst nightmare. But what can you say to the God who gave His most precious Son to buy me a life?

My worst fear was that no one would come.  You’d set it all up and no one would show up. I checked around and there seemed to be about a dozen people who were interested. OK, here we go…so the first night none of them show up. One guy showed up who was a drug addict.  He was a sweet guy and we spent the evening well with him. Of course I had my shirt in a knot when I got home and my conversation with the Lord was something like “this is just what I thought, no one showed up…I hate this. I don’t know what I’m doing.” Blah blah blah..I went on for awhile.  Then I felt like He said, “I don’t want you to evaluate, just do the 6 week course and talk to me about it when it’s over.”  Of course the next week the dozen people all showed up and the first night guy never did return. We had a 6 weeks adventure learning what it was to follow Jesus, to hear His voice, to live in forgiveness, be accountable, all these wonderful pieces of good news. I was terrified the whole time that God’s Spirit would get mixed up and not attend the class, but He was always there, I just had to calm down and wait for Him.

At the end we did have a talk, and He just encouraged me with what happens when I face my fears and walk right into them, facing certain death. Actually the fear was what died.

I

The reason I wanted to write about it is not to tell about what a hard thing I did, but about something I learned along the way. I’ve never had to ask for so much help ever!  There were many times a day when I had to call out “I need help”.  I learned that as soon as I called, I would be strengthened, it was tangible help. I could actually carry through and do something that I was ready to give up on. This was a really important thing for me to have to call out  maybe 50 times a day for help. Normally I don’t think of asking for help that many times. I’ve found after the fast that I do think of it more often, I guess because I did it so often, it became sort of a habit!

There were times when I did stick something in my mouth, so the month was not a perfect fast with no boo-boos at all, but each time rather than getting depressed about it, I just confessed my weakness to God and asked for strength to get back on track and carry on. I remember my niece training her little 3 yr old, when he would get so frustrated that he couldn’t do something, she would say, OK , try again!  It not only works for a 3 year old, it was helpful for a 60 year old!

One day about half way through, I was having a very bleak day and I was seriously wondering if I could DO THIS! It was very hard, and I started to doubt if I could actually complete the second half of the fast. I said, “Lord, I don’t think I can do this, can You talk to me?  I need to hear from You about what You think.”  A little while later I received a late Christmas card from Matte Downey. I looked at it and thought it would probably win our annual Christmas card contest for the most creative card. It took a couple of hours for me to get it that the Lord was speaking through the card.  It had 3 raspberries and the caption was “open your mouth and taste how good God is”.  Raspberries are one of my very favorite fruit, and I would have loved to pop them into my mouth, but it seemed that the Lord was saying to me, you think RASPBERRIES are tasty, here is something MUCH BETTER! Let God be food.

I need to say that God literally did satisfy me, I didn’t have a grouchy month, I was able to laugh and enjoy things.  He taught me to enjoy other things than just food. John 6 is really true “I am the bread of life”. I found it satisfying to just commune with Him as I joined others at the table, I found it was a real joy just to enjoy the people and the strength of community, or just to be thankful that anyone could have food. To enjoy the privilege of serving, enjoy the fact that we have groceries to buy in our stores, and finally at the month’s end to enjoy the thrill of obedience even if it’s hard!

“…whatever you do you must do all for the glory of God.” 1 Cor. 10:31

Matte Downey (Eglise Vineyard in  Montreal) has blessed us with her photography and writing gifts. Enjoy!

I  want to do something great with my life, yes I do. I want to love like Mother Teresa and champion freedom like Martin Luther King Jr.  But to be honest, I don’t know where to start. I am not a person wit h great authority. I am not likely to spearhead any earth-shattering event. I don’t have a lot of extra time, and magnificent opportunities don’t come knocking at my door on a regular basis. And even if they did, I don’t know that I would have the required amount of charisma or the necessary skills to take full advantage of them.

None of this seems to bother God. In fact, every morning when we talk about the day ahead, he seems perfectly happy th at my time is filled with mostly small, insignificant, and mundane tasks. How does one save the world while doing laundry, buying groceries, and walking through the neighbourhood?

I invited a friend to go grocery shopping with me. As we pushed a cart through the bread aisle, we found ourselves confessing our shortcomings to each other and shedding tears as we expressed a desire to be free from our petty fears and obsessions. The grocery store becam e a holy place where God listened and forgave and freed.

I have a friend who comes over to do laundry. I love doing laundry because it always reminds me that no matter how filthy and smelly things may get, clean and fresh are only an hour away. Many times we have worked through personal issues together and encouraged each other through hopeless places while the grimy clothes swished in soapy water nearby. My laundry closet has been a place of spiritual catharsis.

I have walked to the corner store with a friend, chatting and raving about my multi-cultural neighbourhood, pointing out bright flowers, blue sky, overhead planes, and ducks in a pond. Somewhere along the way, my love for this place became contagious. The goodness of God shone brighter than any dark cloud over our lives, and complaints were replaced with wonder and gratitude. My city is filled with the glory of God.

Sometimes I forget the power that ordinary things – done with honesty and grace in the company of others – can have. I am changing my world, one dirty sock at a time, yes I am.

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